We made a little more progress tonight. I mounted up the headlight bar that Pete Eastwood dropped and then set the headlights in place. The fuel gauge on the car was severely corroded. I attempted to save it, but the brass block broke when I tried to work off the ferrule nut. An attempt to locate a nice original gauge didn't pan out, so I picked up this '35 gauge to use for parts. I had to slit the two metal brackets that are crimped on the brass block, but after that the swap was easy. I tig'd a little silicon bronze to connect the split again, and calibrated the gauge with some new fluid.
Here's another shot of the headlights in the light showing the bar that P-Wood dropped..... I got the front spreader bar, bumper, and apron installed tonight. I spent a good chunk of the evening trying to get the reflectors back in the cowl lamp buckets and once I did, I managed to break one of the lenses. I hope to finish up the Columbia hard lines tomorrow night, and fill everything with fluids.
Great progress, looks like all is going together a planned. Pete dropped the headlight bar on my 3W and straightened it after the car was wrecked. Great craftsman and nice guy. Looking forward to your completion of the '32.
We've been chugging away on the 3w lately. Over the weekend, I wrapped up the remaining electrical items, so we started to reassemble the interior. The dash came first, followed by an accessory gauge panel that Dan built. It houses two smooth bezel Stewart Warner gauges to monitor oil pressure and water temperature, and the control for the Columbia. The floor went in, followed by a new carpet from LeBaron Bonney (the original was long gone), and the seat. We fired the engine up yesterday and it did great, though the fuel pump is leaking around the outlet port. It was a pump that I've carried for the past couple of years as a back up for my roadster, so it looks like it wouldn't have helped out anyway. I think that either the flare isn't machined correctly, or the casting is porous around the port. Either way, a new pump is getting delivered tomorrow so we'll have some running video soon. Besides dropping the headlight bar, Pete Eastwood provided the original passenger side tail light stand. For those who know, they're pretty hard to come by. We installed a passenger '33-36 tail light bucket with a '32 lens and bezel so we could end up with dual tail lights using original parts. The '33-36 bucket is not a Duolamp light the driver's side, but it doesn't have the license plate window, making it look cleaner. We wrapped the rearend up with a luggage bar to replace the spare tire carrier. We just need to finish up the rear shock mounts, then finish shaving the sidewalls and we'll be starting to run some shakedown miles....
I was wondering if there is a chance I could talk you into making me a pettern of the side of your orignal seat on paper and mailing it to me? I need to make the sides for my build and do not have anything to go by. I would pay you for your trouble. Thanks, 383deuce
Are those wires tied with string? It looks really clean. I've said it before......but...great build. Posted using the Full Custom H.A.M.B. App!
Sure thing - I'll send you a PM for details. Give me a few days to get this thing wrapped up first. It's cable laced with a waxed string.
got my first glimpse of this car at columbus goodguys today and it looks better in person. pictures dont due it justice. nice work. its hard to believe how nice and solid this car really is. good talking to you and your father in law.
Well it's been awhile since I posted progress on the car. We were in a mad thrash to get the 3w done, and my new 5w back together in time for the Good Guys show in Columbus. Fortunately, we made it but it was a ton of work with a few of those "steps backward" along the way. On June 25th, we were finally going to take the car on it's first drive around the block. I fired it up, pushed the clutch in, and tried to pull it into first. It wouldn't go though, and would grind.....the input shaft wasn't slowing down. I shut the car off, pulled it into first, and fired it up. It didn't try to pull the car, so I eased the clutch out to get the car outside. Sure enough, once I left the gear I couldn't get it back in. I pulled the floor and inspection cover on the trans and confirmed the pressure plate was lifting. The next day, I pulled the engine out of the car to troubleshoot the problem. The input shaft looked good (no signs of rubbing the back of the crank), so I turned to the clutch. Once I had the disk off, I test fit it on the input shaft. It slid on just fine until the very end when it bound on the splines. It turns out that the disk couldn't slide on the input shaft, and was hard against the flywheel, not allowing the input shaft to slow when the clutch was disengaged. I had a brand new clutch (different size though) from Fort Wayne Clutch for my 5w and tried the new disk on the input shaft. It fit great. I took the suspect disk and tried it on a core '39 trans and confirmed it bound again. So now that we knew what the problem was, we looked to see where we could get a disk the quickest - bare in mind this decision was made about 8pm that Thursday. Dan and Ashley were going to Lansing on Friday, which meant Fort Wayne wasn't really out of the question. I called Fort Wayne Clutch Friday morning to make sure they had a 10" disk in stock, and had them set it aside. By the time I got home from work, they were back and we were putting things back together. It was back together that night with a couple small details to button up Saturday morning. https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=685749610659 This past weekend we started to put some more miles on the car to shakeout the inevitable bugs. On Saturday, we took the car down to Woodward to grab some dinner at Vinsetta Garage. The car ran great, rode great, the Columbia shifted great, etc. I ran home at 70mph on the highway, and the car loved it. Sunday, Dan came down and we took my 5w and his 3w out for a drive. The car did well for him as well as we grabbed lunch in Milford and stopped at the Baker's weekly cruise for a few minutes. We headed home and as we were leaving a stoplight about a mile from my house, the driveshaft let go. He coasted into a parking lot and we had it towed to my house. Interestingly enough, all six torque tube to banjo bolts had been pulled out of the banjo flanged and remained safety wired together (so we knew something had gone wrong inside the torque tube). I pulled the axle after it had cooled off at the house, and found that the driveshaft tube had broke at the weld on the rear coupler. As it cracked, the tube started to tear torsionally which tried to make it longer, finding the weakest link of the closed driveline to separate - those six bolts. Fortunately, it only pulled the threads off of the bolts and did not damage the threads in the banjo flange. I was able to chase the threads and clean those up. You may remember we shortened this '33/34 torque tube and driveshaft to use the Columbia. We shortened the driveshaft on the front side, and that weld still looked great. We welded the torque tube in a fixture to make sure it was true, and checked it again today to confirm it is still true. So I guess that means that factory weld might have been fatigued over it's service in the past 81-ish years, and the additional torque from this motor might have been too much for it. Today, Dan remachined the front splined coupler and rear splined coupler after removing the original tube. He picked up a new piece of DOM tubing to make a new complete driveshaft tomorrow. If all goes well, we'll be reassembling things in the next coupe of days. By the way (shameless plug coming....), Ashley just finished up some new Webb Automotive Art t-shirts with artwork by Norwell. One has this car on it, and they can be seen in the classifieds.
Cory, Not rushing ya, but just wanted to remind you about the pattern of your seat. Thanks....3 window is looking great!
Today, Dan welded the new driveshaft together. We were constrained on the ID of the torque tube to go with a larger driveshaft tube, so we went with a heavier wall to gain a little more strength and ended up with about 5% more cross section (it can't hurt). When I got home from work today, I reassembled everything, checked fluid levels in the Columbia and trans, and set everything in place. After a quick brake bleed, the car was done - and not too bad considering the old shaft broke about 48 hours before. I heard Dan talked with a pretty cool guy named Bob today who happened to be at our wedding. Here's a shot of that A-pillar tag with the address of the service station. The writing isn't readable anymore, but I was able to do a pencil tracing and the service was in 1958 with of 55,793 miles on the car.
Damn Larry - you just now noticed it? I bought this car from Reggie Hill a couple months ago. It's running a mild 59a engine, with a '39 trans and a '40 rearend with a Halibrand V8 q/c. I went through and changed up the wheels/tires, axle/spindles, dash, and some things on the engine. We're going to enjoy it in this state for some time while I build another original chassis with a '57 283 dual quad engine and then add fenders to it.
I've been living under a rock lately...diggin' reggies old coupe edit*** Big Al just sent me a link to Instagram. I got to see all the poop on the coop. Funny, I just sold a set of those exact gauges to Scott Gillen for his new roadster that Brizio is building.
Love the car and the work. Question: I can't tell on the photos - what material did you use to secure the wiring underhood ? Is that a type of thin sturdy twine ?
The Jalopy Journal
